Bob Dylan Accused of "Borrowing" Passages from SparkNotes in Nobel Prize Speech

Bob Dylan

Fifty-two years ago, driving my '59 VW bug along the Old Benson Highway between Kent and Renton, Washington, I was horrified by some lyrics blasted out by KJR, Seattle's rock station.

You see me on the street

You always act surprised

You say, “How are you?” “Good luck”

But you don’t mean it

When you know as well as me

You’d rather see me paralyzed

Why don’t you just come out once

And scream it

"Positively 4th Street," Bob Dylan

That kind of brutal honesty was not typical of early 60's popular music, but Dylan was not the ordinary crooner.

She was workin’ in a topless place

And I stopped in for a beer

I just kept lookin’ at the side of her face

In the spotlight so clear

And later on as the crowd thinned out

I’s just about to do the same

She was standing there in back of my chair

Said to me, “Don’t I know your name?”

I muttered somethin’ underneath my breath

She studied the lines on my face

I must admit I felt a little uneasy

When she bent down to tie the laces of my shoe

Tangled up in blue

"Tangled Up in Blue," Bob Dylan

Dylan, the so-called "poet of his generation," is now being charged with plagiarism in his recent Nobel Prize speech in Stockholm, Sweden, where he's said to have "quoted" from Moby-Dick by Herman Melville.  Dylan's quote from the book is not found in the novel, but, instead, apparently comes from SparkNotes, an online site similar to Cliff Notes.  Several other passages of Dylan's acceptance speech appear to have been lifted from the site, although with a few words shifted.  Here is the link to original story on Slate by AndreaPitzer: http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2017/06/did_bob_dylan_take_from_sparknotes_for_his_nobel_lecture.html

Diego Lee Rot

We spoke with Brownsville Observer's Punk Rock reporter and musical historian, Diego Lee Rot, for a possible explanation for the prolific wordsmith's alleged behavior:

"Dylan probably procrastinated till the last minute for his Nobel Prize speech, sort of like not working on a term paper until the night before it's due, then, simply lifted some stuff from Sparknotes.  

Dylan could have ad libbed about Woody Guthrie for hours, but with his award being in "literature," he had to show himself to be well read.  He probably wanted to give the $920,000 award to his grandkids.  But, for a guy whose poured out over 500 songs, to use someone else's words, it was like billionaire Donald Trump stealing the tip from the table at a Mexican restaurant."